CO2 Emission as a Severe Global Environmental Concern Essay

For years, many scientists, environmentalists, and energy experts have been studying how human’s creation and use of energy has impacted our environment. These experts have discovered some troubling facts. Most of our country’s energy is created from burning fossil fuels that pollute our atmosphere, contribute to global warming, and thus threaten the future of our planet. But there’s a safe and effective solution to this problem: nuclear power. Nuclear power should be used more in the United States to create clean power that doesn’t pollute our environment, in order to help combat climate change.

Arjun Makhijani, a prominent researcher for The Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, claims that today’s emission rate of carbon dioxide is about nine gigatons annually and that the Earth only has the capability to absorb 3 gigatons annually—thus a problem arises. Furthermore, Makhijani states that about 2/3rds of the carbon dioxide emissions are caused by the burning of fossil fuels such as coal and petroleum. With those shocking statistics in mind, fossil fuel’s emission of carbon dioxide is thought to be the leading cause of climate change—which is responsible for irreversible and catastrophic changes to the Earth. Yet, scientist had tremendous difficulty finding a safe, effective, and efficient form of energy supply that will met the great consumption rate. Many prominent scientist suggest that nuclear power is the most plausible explanation and solution to the fuel crisis. However, despite nuclear power having a exponentially lower emission rate, it presents its own hazards and threats—such as the Chernobyl and the Three Mile Island incidents. These accidents have many activists and politicians cautious about the prospect of using nuclear power as a complete alternative to fossil fuels—regardless nuclear plants are responsible for 11% of the energy supplied to the world annually (World Nuclear Association.) What many of the activist and politicians seem to overlook is that fossil fuels are an indefinite energy supply and will quite possible run out within

CO2 is the most significant greenhouse gas, which mainly comes from the use of fossil fuels. Many people feel that content of CO2 in the atmosphere is the main reason for manmade global warming. The main sources of CO2 emissions involve electricity generation, industrial processes, fumes from transportation and commercial buildings and use. Emissions of greenhouse gases, such as CO2, to the atmosphere are expected to cause even more of a significant change in global climate (Davison, 2007). The main focus to try to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is to reduce the amount that is released from coal-fired power plants. Greenhouse gas emissions that involve the productions of electricity come from natural gas production and coal-fired power plant operations. Natural gas production accounts for twenty-four percent and coal-fired power plant operations accounts for seventy-five percent, while the other one percent is caused by other electricity generation operations. The main reason why coal-fired power plants have a higher percentage of emissions is because the sulfur content of coal is much higher than that of other fossil fuels (Jarmaillo et al., 2007). This proves that there is a great need to find an alternative fossil fuel to use instead of coal. Although coal is easy to mine, transport and process for the electricity generation process, it is also the

Throughout this world, we use various equipment that need certain energy requirements in order for them to run properly. Two of the utmost imperative sources of energy in our world today come from coal and nuclear power. Still, a great deal of citizens of this world are unaware of the impacts of nuclear power whether it be positive or negative due to the fact that nuclear power has not existed as long as coal power has. However, as nuclear power becomes a major resource of energy, we as citizens must determine which is more fitting for not only us, but our environment. As this report continues on, you will come to find the history of each of these resources along with the advantages and disadvantages of each. Concluded from this research was the concept that nuclear power is worthier for America as a whole. Included below are the specific points as to why nuclear power is far superior for American citizens and our environment. However, the main notion to be taken from this report is the view that we need to become further educated on the energy resources present in this world and be able to determine how we can become more efficient and contribute less to climate change in the long run.

Gary Stix calls to Americans to halt global warming. The world is changing and not for the better, he writes “The Debate on Global Warming is Over” (Stix 46). CO2 levels are higher than they have been in 650,000 years and are projected to only increase at an exponential rate. No one knows exactly when and what will happen, but all scientist can agree that it won’t be good. Making a difference in the fight against global warming will require a massive alteration in the entire world’s energy economy. Fossil Fuels account for 80% of the world’s energy and if a “carbon budget” is put into place then they will be ineffective (Stix 47). We need to begin to make a shift towards more renewable sources of energy, and adopt a system to help regulate the total amount of emissions. These programs will give us a head start on lessening the effects of global warming, but the

America’s nuclear energy plants are — by a wide margin — the nation’s largest source of carbon-free power. They produce clean, reliable electricity as well as well-paying jobs. Although several dependable nuclear plants have closed in recent years for economic reasons, nuclear energy is getting a fresh look for its ability to produce vast amounts of power without emitting greenhouse gases. And with new reactor designs, both big and small, scientists and technologists are re-engineering the future of nuclear energy for everyone’s benefit.

In his book, The United States of Excess, Robet L.Paarlberg says, “Per capita carbon-dioxide emissions in the United States are roughly twice the average for the rest of the wealthy world (defined here as the 34 member countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, or OECD)” (7). Contrasting the situation with the wealthy world is enough to realize that the USA has a serious problem of carbon-dioxide emission. If we compare the emission with a poor developing nation like Nepal, the problem is much clearer or, precisely, scary. CO2 emission in metric tons per capita for the United States in 2005 was close to 20 (Brooks 27). Moreover, in 2013, the measurement for the USA was still 16.4 while that for Nepal was 0.2 (“CO2 Emissions (Metric Tons per Capita)”). The figures show that the USA emitted 82 times the carbon emitted by Nepal on a per capita basis. With all the focus towards competing industrially with other wealthy countries, consequently, the USA has not had enough attention towards the resulting problem from carbon emission. Instead, this competition has added up to the emission of more amount of carbon. The difference in technological advancements, education system, and the people’s lifestyles in the two countries is the main reason for the higher per capita carbon emission in the USA.

Wind and Solar” in which they go in depth on why the disposing of toxic carbon fuels and replacing with any other form of energy is detrimental to society. In their own words, “Whatever we decide, we need to make up our minds and fast. Carbon fuels are killing us, and killing the planet as well. And good planets are hard to come by” (Conley and Maloney). The topic of carbon fuels is a rising concern for many people. The burning of these fossil fuels is causing irreversible impacts on many things from our environments to our health. Throughout the years there have been many studies that have shown how the carbon fuels have distorted our health, all the way from something simple like asthma to severe heart problems and possibly premature death. Amongst all this, it’s making global warming rise at an alarming rate causing organisms like mosquitoes that carry diseases be able to roam at a larger extent. If we were to reduce our carbon fuel with something else like nuclear power, it would save thousands of lives and slowly take us out of the risks we suffer from carbon

Humans are polluting our atmosphere causing the Greenhouse Effect.  What’s the Greenhouse Effect?  “The Greenhouse Effect can be visualized as follows: imagine that Earth has been encircled by a giant glass sphere.  The heat of the sun penetrates through the glass.  Some of the heat is absorbed by the Earth, and some is radiated back towards space.  The radiated heat reaches the glass sphere and is prevented from dispersing any further”(Global Warming The Facts).  This makes the heat bounce back towards the Earth, which heats it up tremendously.

The world as we know today is dependent on energy. The options we have currently enable us to produce energy economically but at a cost to the environment. As fossil fuel source will be diminishing over time, other alternatives will be needed. An alternative that is presently utilized is nuclear energy. Nuclear energy is currently the most efficacious energy source. Every time the word ‘nuclear’ is mentioned, the first thought that people have is the devastating effects of nuclear energy. Granting it does come with its drawbacks; this form of energy emits far less pollution than conventional power plants. Even though certain disadvantages of nuclear energy are devastating, the advantages contain even greater rewards.

Climate change or colloquially known as global warming, now pose a new threat to civilization as the levels of greenhouse gases (GHG) are soaring to new levels. The most significant contributor to greenhouse gasses would be Carbon Dioxide (Co2). The levels of Carbon Dioxide (Co2) gas have risen to levels civilization has not seen before. As such, the effects of these levels are not known to civilization as data gathered from the ice cores drilled in the Antarctica only shows data up to 650,000 years ago. However we can conclude that present CO2 concentrations are higher compared to any time in the last 650,000 years (IPCC 2007). Current carbon dioxide concentrations are hovering around 389 parts per million (ppm) as of September 2011,

Nuclear energy could be the future of energy and potentially solve the energy crisis problem. Nuclear energy is a sustainable energy source and it can provide millions of times the amount of energy output from a fixed mass of fuel than any other energy source, such as fossil fuel, for the same mass of fuel. Nuclear energy is also very clean for the atmosphere. It produces no greenhouse gases at all. However, nuclear energy can be very harmful to both people and the rest of the natural environment if not managed well. Nuclear meltdowns etc. can release

   The United States releases twenty tons of carbon monoxide per person per year. Carbon Monoxide release is a result of burning fossil fuels with an insufficient amount of oxygen that causes the formation of carbon monoxide that pollutes our environment. Everyday fuel is burnt by cars, airplanes, large factories and manufacturing plants. This is causing a very large and deadly problem for our environment. When gases used on earth are released into the atmosphere they act as a blanket and trap radiation that is then redirected to earth. This concept is called the Greenhouse Effect (Bad Greenhouse, 1).

Estimating future emissions is difficult, because it depends on demographic, economic, technological, policy, and institutional developments. Several emissions scenarios have been developed based on differing projections of these underlying factors. For example, by 2100, in the absence of emissions control policies, carbon dioxide concentrations are projected to be

As we have come to a better understanding of our global climate, most scientists agree that human actions have had a warming effect on the global climate (IPCC, 2010). This idea of anthropogenic global climate change is the general consensus in the scientific community according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). These views were increasingly challenged, mostly by non-scientists, in late 2009 when servers owned by the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) were hacked. Emails between climate scientists and other documents relating to climate research were taken illegally and leaked online. This event re-energized the climate change debate and created a public relations nightmare for both the CRU and anthropogenic climate change